


Femslash February 2021

by TalesOfOnyxBats



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender, Once Upon a Time (TV), Winx Club
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Blushing, F/F, F/M, Femslash February, Femslash February 2021, First Kiss, Fluff, Hair Braiding, High School, Hurt/Comfort, Insecurity, Mermaid Regina, Moonlight, Public Humiliation, Recreational Drug Use, Reluctant Love, Self Confidence, Self Confidence Issues, Self-Acceptance, Self-Esteem Issues, Soft Azula (Avatar), Teasing, Verbal Humiliation, mermaid
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-12 10:33:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 13,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29134113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TalesOfOnyxBats/pseuds/TalesOfOnyxBats
Summary: A collection of femslash feb prompts for 2021 with various fandoms.
Relationships: Azula/Jin (Avatar), Azula/Suki (Avatar), Azula/Yue (Avatar), Bloom/Icy (Winx Club), Darcy/Riven (Winx Club), Evil Queen | Regina Mills/Emma Swan, Icy/Lucy (Winx Club), Stormy/Helia (Winx Club)
Comments: 22
Kudos: 55
Collections: Femslash February





	1. Many Things

**Author's Note:**

> I've got a lot on my plate with writing (including 4 long fics and an original story) so I probably won't be doing all of the prompts this year but I want to park take no less.

**Since I’ve got a lot on my plate with writing I decided to mash my femslash feb prompt (red) with the first @winter-atla-femslash prompt (first kiss)**

**Prompt: Red & First Kiss**

**Fandom: ATLA**

**Pair: Azula/Yue**

**Summary: Azula is a stuttering mess around Yue. And Yue is fond of making Azula blush.**

* * *

There are many things that make her blush, whether she likes it or not--she certainly doesn’t. But all the same there is an assortment of things; making small talk and thinking back on conversations past, recalling past failures, and getting caught crying.

But these days, mostly it is Yue that leaves her face red.

The girl’s laugh, her light and lithe speech, her soft smiles, and long lashed eyes.

Azula peers into the canal, watching small waves ripple the reflection of a splendid full moon. She nestles herself deeper into her furs and shivers. She ought to go inside before she freezes herself to the bone. 

She backs away from the water and stretches her arms. When she looks back at the water, a new reflection appears on the surface of it next to her own. She hasn’t yet turned around and her cheeks are already burning. 

The Water Tribe princess leans against the bridge rails and remarks, “it’s a beautiful night, isn’t it?” Azula chances a look and finds herself face to face with the prettiest smile. 

“Y-yes, it’s nice. Cold but it’s nice.” 

Yue laughs and Azula’s face grows hotter still. She isn’t sure what is worth laughing at. 

“If you’re cold then why don’t you go inside?”

“I was about to.”

“Then what happened.” 

“I…” She begins. Yue tilts her head and the moonlight catches her face just right. It puts an enthralling and silvery glow into her blue eyes. It halos her complexion and shimmers off of her silky white hair. “I found something pretty to look at. The moon! I’m talking about the moon!” Agni is she grateful that she can blame her colored cheeks on the cold.

**.oOo.**

Yue laughs again. The fire princess is quite something. Poise and grace and elegant speeches, a lovely face, and a way of carrying herself with confidence. And yet she is stumbling her way through this. 

She shouldn’t tease the girl but she can’t quite resist. “That’s not the only pretty thing out here tonight.” 

Yue didn’t think that Azula’s face could grow any more scarlet than it already was. She clears her throat. “Yes. The snow looks lovely too. It’s...glittery.” 

Yue pats the princess’ head. “I was talking about a certain firebender.”

Azula coughs nervously, “right yes, you’re correct. I look nice tonight.” She folds her arms. 

For a moment she simply observes the fire princess, watches her shift from one foot to the other, watches her fiddle with her hair. “Is there another pretty thing that you’ve seen tonight?”

Azula opens her mouth and close it again. Several times. Yue takes her hands, they are so pleasantly warm. 

All it takes is one kiss and her face goes wholly red. She imagines that the princess tries to keep the blush from spreading across her face but it is beyond her control. As far as Yue knows, the girl has never been kissed before, not a real kiss anyhow. 

She makes an effort to return the kiss but she doesn’t quite know how. It is good enough for Yue. It is endearing, she is sure that the firebender will get used to the affection eventually. 

“You’re adorable.” She pokes the princess’ nose. 

She folds her arms over her chest again with a half pout. “I am a fierce princess and you should fear me.”

Yue ruffles her hair. “Maybe when you’re attending council meetings, you’re a little intimidating…”

“Correct, I am intimidating.” She agrees.

“You’re also a softie.” 

She shakes her head, “incorrect.” 

Yue quirks a brow. “Is that right?”

Azula swallows, “yes.”

She wraps her arms around the princess’ torso and rubs her cheek against hers. “If you say so.” She gives the princess another kiss. She pulls her hood over her head in one unsuccessful attempt to conceal another blush. Yue decides to show her at least a little mercy and pretends like she doesn’t notice. “Come on, let’s get you inside before you freeze solid.” She gives the princess a little squeeze. She always knew that the princess was a softie deep down. 


	2. A Heart Of Ice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Pride  
> Fandom: Winx Club  
> Pair: Icy/Bloom  
> Summary: Witches shouldn't be with fairies, Icy knows this. And yet she still finds herself woefully drawn to Bloom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for some swearing and recreational weed.

It is a pride thing, she knows. That is why she can’t give in. That is why she can’t let the fairy love her. Moreso, that is why she can’t love the fairy. Why she can’t love anyone at all. She has a reputation to uphold, a frigid heart to maintain. And if the fairy gets too close the ice around it might just melt. 

She thinks that the danger had always been there. From the very moment that the fairy had so rudely fluttered into her life. She had spunk, determination, and a fire to match her power--however weak it had been the first time they had met. 

How terribly does she wish that the fairy wouldn’t have grown into her powers. Perhaps if she hadn’t--if Icy had had her way and whittled her confidence away to nothing at all--then she would have nothing to be drawn to. But as it were, the fairy has bite. It isn’t all that often that someone has the brazenness to get in her face, to talk back and fight back. And perhaps that is part of her allure. 

Who is she kidding, it is most of Bloom’s allure. 

She had been judgemental of Darcy when she started pining over Riven.Projection, it couldn’t be anything else. To scold and shame Darcy was to scold and shame herself; the both of them could use it. Witches don’t fall in love. Witches aren’t soft. All the same she had been fixated on Bloom. It was for her power and for her power alone, that is what she vowed. But she knows that it was far more than that. 

She thinks of the fairy more than she cares to admit. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so alarming if those thoughts were seeping in simmering resentment. But mostly when her mind drifts to the fairy it is with fondness. 

Fondness for her witty comebacks and for her taking no bullshit. 

Each time that the fairy had gotten the better of her had infuriated and intrigued her in one fell swoop. And so she resents Bloom with more fury. Maybe if she throws enough ice and a generous helping of petty insults, she can drive the feelings out. 

Somewhere along the lines she begins to wonder. Wonder why she has so many reservations. Why she can’t stomach the idea of letting herself fall in love. She could add her own wicked flavor to it.

She doesn’t have to be soft…

But a witch and a fairy? 

Unheard of.

Absolutely vile. 

It was one thing for Darcy to finally cave in and snatch Riven for herself. And this time without the dark intent. It chills even Icy to think that the man had driven dark intent from Darcy. She swallows, if Riven is capable of such a feat then Bloom can surely drive Icy’s essence out. 

She pulls a dusty book--a sinister old tome--from the shelf and flips to a thumbs her way through it. If she can’t find a spell to remove her capacity to love, then she will find one to eradicate her emotions entirely. It can’t possibly get any colder than emotionless. 

Stormy enters their dorm, Helia in tow. Icy swallows; what is happening to them? What have they become? Stormy has her hand in his. Icy thinks that it was a mistake to come back to Cloud Tower and put in a serious effort to graduate. 

Perhaps that is another option; studies come so naturally to her. Maybe she ought simply engross herself in them and make no time for anything else. She is already back at the top of her class, it wouldn’t be too hard to request a heavier workload. 

Stormy takes a seat and leans against Helia. He is doing ‘the hair thing’ again. The hair thing, as Icy has come to find out, is when Helia puts his hands on either side of her head and floofs the witch’s hair like he might do with a pillow. 

“Gag me.” Darcy rolls her eyes. 

Riven chuckles and sets his drink down. Apparently the sentiment is shared by everyone but Stormy and Helia. Not that they are paying any mind to anyone around them. 

“So, Icy?” Darcy speaks up. “Does it feel weird to be the only one without a guy?”

“Yeah!’ Stormy perks up. “Aren’t you lonely?”

Icy flips the page with more force than necessary. “What happened to love is repulsive, ladies?”

Darcy shrugs, “we’re supposed to be turning a new leaf or whatever.” 

“And besides.” Stormy grumbles. “If that Mirta can go full on fairy then why shouldn’t we mix it up?” 

“You just like having someone play with your hair.” 

“Wouldn’t you though?” Helia asks. He gives Stormy’s hair a final ruffle. 

“You don’t have to find a gentle man like Helia.” Riven points out. “There are plenty of men like yours truly.” He wiggles his brows. 

“Stop that.” Darcy swats him. 

“Helia is not a gentle man! He’s tough!” 

Helia clears his throat. “Actually, I like to think that I am a gentle soul.”

“Helia is a pacifist.” Riven reminds. 

Icy is certain that, that is exactly why things are going so smoothly between the two. In the way that Darcy and Riven share a rougher edge, Helia and Stormy are perfect opposites. He is the mellow to her tempestuousness and she is punch in the face when he can use a bodyguard. 

“I am not interested in men, ‘real’ or not.” Icy says flatly. And she isn’t lying. She couldn’t care less about the specialists. Fairies. She likes fairies. She rubs her face with her hands. Why does she have to like fairies? 

She’d been rather fond of Mirta too.

She hadn’t been fond, she had loved her from the start; loved that quirky hair cut, and that newage fashion, that stupid pumpkin shirt... and so she had to get rid of her. Had to drive her out. 

She slams the book shut and shoves it aside. 

“Whao, that book too difficult for you?” Darcy asks.

She isn’t in the mood for jokes and jests. “It’s useless, Darcy! Just like a certain witch!”

Stormy cackles. “She got you, Darcy!” 

“Shut up.” 

The sound of their squabbles follows her down the hall. 

**.oOo.**

Bloom would feel awful, absolutely guilty if Icy hadn’t made her first year at Alfea so difficult. But the fact is that she had. She had made it so hard. Maybe it is the witchy thing to do, but she can’t resist. She flashes her most charming smile as the witch passes, “morning, Icy.” 

The woman halts and seems to go rigid. “What do you want?” 

Bloom props herself against the outerwall of a boutique. “Just trying to be friendly.”

“Disgusting.” 

Bloom laughs and the witch swallows. Bloom isn’t certain, not one hundred percent, but she is fairly confident that her long time foe isn’t as resentful as she would like Bloom to think. Her quips lack their usual power, their typical sting. Tecna swears up and down that, according to her calculations, the likelihood of Icy harboring some deeply closeted feelsings for her are rather high. 

Mostly, the ice witch has been ignoring her entirely. It is a change of pace and Bloom finds it surprisingly hard to adjust to. 

“Come on, aren’t you going to trash my outfit or something? Tell me that my hair looks awful?” 

Icy shrugs. “I don’t have the time to waste on you.” She gestures to an armful of textbooks. 

She knows that she shouldn’t. She knows that Griffin would applaud her for it. But the words leave her mouth before she can stop them, “you mean you don’t want me to be your study buddy?” 

“I can think of nothing more revolting.” The witch, to the best of her ability with them full, crosses her arms across her chest. 

“If you say so. I was going to maybe call Sky.” Bloom returns the shrug. “He’s been asking if I’d be interested in rekindling a spark.”

“Is that supposed to mean something to me?” Her voice is level. Frigid as ever. But her eyes betray her at least somewhat. 

Bloom thinks of the time that the witch had nearly murdered Kiko, thinks of how she’d yanked her powers from her after tormenting her parents. Suddenly it is so easy, “of course it does.” She steps closer to the witch. Leans in, close to her ear and whispers, “I know.”

Icy gives a soft tsk. “What do you think you know?”

Bloom tilts her head and brushes Icy’s bangs behind her ear. The witch gives a slight shudder. “I know how you feel about me.” 

That blush is priceless. Almost enough to make up for several years of relentless harassment. But it isn’t quite enough. “I wonder how the other witches would react to that…”

And then her face drains of all color. Somehow she is paler than usual. “As if I would fall in love with a  _ fairy _ .” She spits the word like a poison before deliberately shoving her way past. 

The guilt washes over her immediately. How could she have weaponized love like that? She isn’t sure how Icy can talk the way that she does with no remorse whatsoever. For what it’s worth, Bloom can’t bring herself to hate Icy, afterall she does owe her confidence and prowess to the witch. “Icy, wait!” 

She doesn’t know why she had bothered. Icy isn’t one for talking on a good day. Much less on a day where her pride has been put on the line along with some sturdy blackmail. 

**.oOo.**

Helia is slumbering in Stormy’s arms and Darcy and Riven are well into a hit of weed. She slams the door anyhow. Darcy and Riven jerk. Stormy bolts right up with a, “whao! What’s going on?” 

“Go back to sleep.” She grumbles though she doesn’t exactly help her do that when she slams her textbooks down on the table.

“Who bristled your broomstick?” Darcy quirks a brow.

“That loser, Bloom.” 

“Really, you’re still feuding with her?” 

“What of it, Darcy? We have many scores to settle.” And she is falling very behind where victories are concerned. 

“Have you tried working things out with her?” Helia asks.

“Why would I want to do that?” But more than anything she does. She doesn’t want to want that, but she does. So so badly. She kicks her boots off and flops down upon her mattress. “That is the last thing I’d like to do.”

“If you say so.” Darcy rolls her eyes. “But would it kill you to keep your lover’s quarrels to yourself?”

Stormy sniggers. It takes everything in Icy’s soul to not jerk upright. Though her entire body goes rigid she grumbles, “would it kill you to hit your blunts outside?”

  
  


**.oOo.**

She doesn’t see Icy for quite some time. Maybe a month and a few days since their last run in. Possibly it is better that way. But she their last encounter constantly replays in her head and each time she finds herself biting her lip, her stomach fluttering with unease. She likes to think that the witch will be okay considering that her secret has been quite safe. She’d even avoided talking about it with Stella. If Stella found out, everyone else would. 

So it has been Tecna and Flora who have been hearing the most of her complaints and concerns. And it was Flora who suggested trying to speak with Icy again. She finds the witch sitting in an ice cream parlor. She should have known that Icy would lurk there. 

Bloom takes a deep breath and sits herself across from Icy. 

The witch gives a very pointed and sharp inhale. She doesn’t look up. “What do you want, pixie?”

“To apologize.” She starts. “I wouldn’t have told anyone, I know how brutal witches can be.” 

Suddenly Icy is fully invested in her ice cream. Granted, she was pretty enthralled with the treat to begin with. Bloom bites back a chuckle. 

“I guess I was just mad about...everything.”

“Get to the point.” 

“I sort of started with my point. Sorry for…” she trails off. She has a pretty good feeling that Icy wouldn’t take well to her so bluntly calling her on her feelings. “For implying that you would be in love with me. That’s crazy, right.” 

“Don’t bullshit me, Bloom. You knew exactly what you were doing. You know that I know...blah blah, you get the gist.” 

This time Bloom does laugh. The witch’s sense of humor is rather agreeable when it isn’t at someone else’s expense. 

“Alright. I’m sorry that I made fun of your crush.”

“Fuck off.”

Bloom shakes her head. “Do you really want that?”

“Yes.” She takes a particularly big spoonful of ice cream. “I really do.”

Bloom sighs. “But do you want that because you actually want me to leave or because you don’t want to be seen with me.”

“Oh, we can be seen together. Anytime you’d like to blast some spells at one another you can give me a call.” She slides a slip of paper across the table. 

She hadn’t realized that the witch was so smooth. She supposes that Icy hadn’t amassed herself such a following way back when by stumbling over her words. “You just gave me your number.” 

“Yes, so you can always be one phone call away from getting your ass kicked.” She looks so smug. “I’ve got plenty of new spells to test run.”

Bloom laughs again. But her smile fades. “You’re allowed to be in love, Icy. Darcy and Stormy are. Lucy is.” 

“That’s different.”

“How?” 

She has no more ice cream left to distract herself with. “I-I can’t be with a fairy.” She looks away. It doesn’t really offer her anything but an illusion of dignity. 

“Why not?” Bloom doesn’t think that she has ever seen the witch so flustered, almost timid. She doesn’t think that she will ever see it again. 

“You said it yourself, witches are brutal.” 

Bloom brushes strands of silver-blue hair out of her face and cups the witch’s cheek. It is cool to the touch. “Are you implying that you can’t destroy them all?” Bloom quirks a brow. 

She clears her throat, “I can take on the entire student body and win.” 

Now that sounds more like the witch she knows.

**.oOo.**

“Then do it.” 

Icy frowns. “Peters…” 

“What?”

“You should tread carefully.”

She smirks, “am I on thin ice?”

Again she wonders just why the hell she has to be in love with Bloom fucking Peters of all people. “Extremely.” 

“I thought that you liked it when people tell you how powerful you are.”

“I do, yes.” She replies. 

“So show everyone. You’re...you. You haven’t let anyone tell you what to do in the past…”

She thinks of Darkar and Valtor and begs to differ.

“So don’t let them tell you what to do--or not to do--now.” Bloom tucks the slip of paper into her pocket. “I can call you tonight and we can fight like usual or you can put on your best choker and we can have a nice dinner.” 

And just like that she leaves. The clever little beast. Icy gathers her belongings and makes her way back to the dorm. It is empty this time. It is date night, she recalls. She is alone with the silence, the only sound comes from a rhythmically ticking grandfather clock. 

She completes three classes worth of assignments and stretches out on her bed. Precisely when she gets nice and comfortable her phone rings.  _ Peters _ . “This better be good, I was rather comfy.”

“Meet me at the Magix City green. I have both my dragon fire and a cute dress. Don’t tell me which your bringing, I like a surprise.” Before Icy can reply the line clicks. She is certain that Bloom knows exactly what decision will be made. 

Against her better judgement, she fixes her choker around her neck.


	3. Where They Should Be

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt(s): Buttercup (femslash feb) & Braiding (atla femslash)  
> Fandom: ATLA  
> Pair: Jinzula  
> Summary: Jin braids Azula's hair and helps her confront her imperfections.

Jin runs the comb through her hair. She snags it more than once. Azula flinches each time. And each time Jin kisses her cheek and gives her an overly cheery, ‘whoops, sorry.’ Azula folds her arms across her chest and pouts, caught somewhere between annoyed and smitten. 

“Your hair is so silky.” Jin muses aloud. “Mine is so dry, I wish that I had your hair.”

Azula wouldn’t wish that upon anyone. She isn’t sure that she likes her hair anymore. She feels Jin tangling her fingers in her locks. “What are you doing?”

“Has anyone ever braided your hair before?” 

Azula shakes her head. “It isn’t a Fire Nation tradition, we prefer…”

“Top knots and honor, yeah, I know. But you’re in the Earth Kingdom now and I think that it’s time to try something new. It’ll look cute.” 

She doesn’t think that cute is what she aspires to be; beautiful, imposing, confident--that is how she’d like to look. Cute is not her thing. Cute is TyLee’s thing. And yet she lets the woman play with her hair anyhow. 

“Have you ever thought about shaving your hair?” 

Azula jerks, “absolutely not!” She clutches her hair almost protectively. 

Jin pauses her braiding to give a full belly laugh. “I was just joking. But I think that you could work a shaved head.” 

“I’ll take the braids.” She grumbles. At least those could be unravel and corrected if they look as ridiculous as she anticipates. Jin hums to herself as she continues toying with Azula’s locks. Azula fixes her eyes upon the city streets. The view is rather nice from Jin’s balcony, the midday sun bathes green-tiled roofs in a soft, glinting gold. It sparkles itself over puddles left over from last nights rain. Azula smells the lingering petrichor in the air around her. 

Jin steps back, “all done, have a look!” She grins and leads Azula to the mirror. 

Azula’s stomach flutters, she hasn’t looked in a mirror since…

She swallows. 

She isn’t sure that she will be pleased with what she will see and so she doesn’t want to see it at all. She doesn’t want to know what her face looks like since losing daily access to the royal spa.

She looks up anyhow. She watches Jin’s reflection wrap her arms around the torso of her own reflection. “What do you think?”

She studies her face for the first time in a while. She swallows down a lump that has formed in her throat. She feels the pressure of unshed tears building behind her eyes. It is as she had dreaded, her face is blemished and her light dusting of freckles are somehow more obvious than before. 

But her hair. It looks nice. Her bangs frame it nicely again and she supposes that the twin braids are flattering on her. 

“It’s nice.” It is the best that she has felt about her hair in a long while. She wishes that she could say the same about her faces. 

“Oh wait! One more thing!” She turns around and holds up a flower. A little white buttercup and tucks it behind her ear. “Perfect.”

She isn’t perfect. But the buttercup is a nice touch. “I like it.”

“Great!” Jin smiles. She puts herself between Azula and the mirror and stoops down for a kiss. Her smile falters, “you don’t look happy.”

“My hair isn’t the problem.”

Jin sighs, “you always seem to have a problem with yourself.”

“Because there always is a problem. I used to be…”

“Too perfect.” Jin cuts her off. “I like this much more. It’s…” she pauses. “Authentic. But if it doesn’t make you happy then we can go back to the palace and they can fix up the way you like.” 

But Azula isn’t sure that she wants that either. She does think that being perfect had made her happy. If anything it just makes her feel as though she has to meet some unattainable standards. They are all mostly self imposed. And for what? She no longer has her father to impress, she had well and disappointed him. She doesn’t have her nation to impress because they are moving on from their rigidity. 

Maybe she should too. 

Though the habits are so deeply ingrained…

Jin’s fingers rub against her cheek. They rub against it and with so much affection and she isn’t sure why. She isn’t sure how Jin can ignore the blemishes. She studies Jin’s face. The girl has her own share of imperfections. Azula is rather fond of those. She wishes that she could be as fond of her own. 

“Do you like them?” 

“Hmm?” 

“Your freckles.” Azula specifies, “do you like them?” 

“You ask some strange questions.”

“Answer them.” She should add a please.

“I don’t mind them.” Jin says. “Why?”

Azula shrugs. “I like them.” 

The woman smiles. One of those smiles that has her eyes squeezing shut. “Yours are pretty too.” She ruffles Azula’s hair, knocking the buttercup out of place. Azula catches it and weaves it into Jin’s hair. 

“Are we playing pass the flower?”

“Pass the flower?” 

“When it falls out of my hair, I give it back to you and then when it falls out of your hair, you give it back to me?”

“Sure, Jin. We can play pass the flower.” It is those little things that make her heart flutter.

And the profound things that draw it to Jin completely. Jin smiles again, “I think that you’re perfect Azula. All of those freckles and those little scars. They’re all placed perfectly where they should be.”

She thinks that one of those tears has managed to leak out. But she isn’t distraught. She isn’t unhappy. She is so overwhelmingly relieved. 


	4. In Shades Of Orange

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Orange  
> Fandom: Winx Club  
> Pair: Icy/Bloom  
> Summary: A spell transfers Icy's darkness to Bloom. After taking it back, Icy finds herself conflicted about being a witch again.

The switch had been more than jarring and even with it corrected, she still isn’t right. She reaches up and touches Bloom’s cheek. Rubs her thumb over it and tells herself that it is only residue. The feelings will fade in time. 

It is hardly the first night she has spent with Bloom. She wonders if the fairy has residue of her own. Lingering inclinations to cast dark spells and taunt the other fairies on this campus. The fairy-turned-witch had been quite a force. A nearly unstoppable one. One that Icy hadn’t particularly wanted to stop at the time. 

She could do it rather easily, it was as easy as speaking a simple spell. A simple spell that would harness the evil and dark energy that had been laced into the former fairy’s soul. The very dark energy that had been torn from her in the first place. All she had to do was take it back. 

At the time she hadn’t wanted it back. 

At the time she had acquired an insticutal aversion to an evil so potent and sinister.

At the time she had enough good in her soul to give in and let the evil back in. And in a flash of bright orange, so it was. She now longs for it to fester and grow, to reclaim her in full. To encompass her entirely as it had before it had been forced out of her. But it refuses her. For some reason, it refuses her. She thinks that her body has become incompatible with the darkness. 

And so she remains at Alfea and in the company of Bloom, confined to a hospital bed and condemned to magical therapy. Her powers aren’t right either, she hasn’t recovered them in full and the magic therapy makes for such a slow recovery. 

A slow, strange recovery. 

**.oOo.**

Bloom stares down at Icy, for everything that she has gone through, she seems to sleepy rather easy. She isn’t quite the same as she was before it is both comforting and unsettling all at once. It is petrubing in that it confirms what she has been thinking--that there is still darkness in her soul and comforting in that she isn’t alone. 

The both of them are oddities, anomalies. Both witches and fairies all at once. Tecna is almost certain that, that is why her magic has been so weak lately. Why she hasn’t been quite able to muster up the full power of the dragon flame. 

The dark and the light are at odds in her soul and the sooner she lets herself fully embrace being a fairy again, the sooner she will get her strength back. And yet there is something so enthralling about the witch magic she harbors. Something deliciously alluring about tossing reservations and moral comasses aside. 

It is powerful.

It raises adrenaline in the way her fire craves. 

She can’t sleep. 

She tries to sleep but how can she when there is so much at work in her mind and soul? 

The former witch could probably use some rest, but Bloom could use the company, so she shakes Icy awake. 

**.oOo.**

She lets Bloom toy with her hair for hours. Occasionally running her own fingers though strands of orange hair. This is rather routine. It is almost a habit now. Every now and then she will let the fairy lay next to her and rub circles on her back. Every now and then she lets the fire fairy hold her. 

She swears that it is just the residue. 

That the darkness will overtake it soon and she will break the fairy’s heart with a swiftness that even Darcy would envy. 

It can only be the residue, she wouldn’t let the fairy take control otherwise. The fairy wouldn’t take control if she hadn’t any witch left in her. She knows it because as the darkness begins to leave Bloom, she grows far less domineering. 

But Icy herself grows no more so. 

For a change, she does the holding. She wraps her arms around the fairy and rests her head upon the fairy’s. 

“Ya know, I’m going to be really upset when you go full on witch again.” Bloom mutters. 

She is torn between agreeing and vowing that she can’t wait for it to happen. She doesn’t think that it will. She thinks that she has exposed herself to too much light. Her surprise is almost laughable when the dark slams back into her with a vengeful force. And with it comes her confidence and her boldness. With it comes her wit and sarcasm. How she had missed those. 

She leaves Alfea that night without a word to anyone. With luck Bloom will be as upset as she had promised. 

**.oOo.**

There is a comfort in the normalcy. In fending off Icy in bursts of fire and showers of brilliant orange sparks. A comfort in seeing the witch grit her teeth and scowl at her. A comfort in listening to her vow payback as she always had. 

There is a woefully depressing edge with all of it. A sense of yearning that comes with remembering how kindly cold her touches had been on those nights in the hospital. A longingness that accompanies those memories. 

She misses the ice fairy the way she misses the calm of winter on a hectic summer day. She has only the ice witch now and the woman hurts like ice closing in around her as she sinks beneath the surface of a pond. 

“You know, I’m glad that you defeated me, Bloom!” She calls. “Nothing rekindles hatred like a good defeat.” 

She hadn’t exactly meant to say it out loud, but she does. “Then maybe I should let you win.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” Icy asks. 

Bloom shrugs. And she gives it her all. She fights to the best of her ability but today it just isn’t good enough. Or maybe it is that Icy is simply fighting with more hatred and force than before. The ice witch looms in front of her, just as she had the day that she had stolen her powers.

She crinkles her nose, “I told you not to hold back, Bloom.”

“I’m not.” Bloom scowls. And as the witch summons her crystal, Bloom grabs her collar and pulls her forward. She presses her lips against Icy’s. A shiver runs through her body at the frostiness. She gives a second shiver when the witch doesn’t pull back and a third when she returns the kiss.

**.oOo.**

She is panting slightly when she does pull back, first her lips and then her whole body. The fairy doesn’t make a move. She can’t seem to either. It comes back to her in a steady flow; how well those nights in the hospital had been. 

She remembers them in shades of orange; the orange of Bloom’s hair. The orange of her warmth. And a vivid red-orange of passion. She hasn’t been able to shake these things since they happened. Not entirely. 

She thinks that the harder she works to suppress the touch of light that remains in her soul, the brighter it shines. And perhaps it is time to give in. Perhaps she should just take the light and roll with it. With care and effort, she supposes that she can be a fairy and still be the biggest asshole in Magix at the same time.

She curls her fingers in Bloom’s hair. “I truly hate you.” 

“That sure is a funny way of saying that you want to kiss me again.” 

“Witches aren’t exactly poetic.” She grumbles before pressing her lips to the fairy’s once more. She supposes that there’s no harm in keeping her enemy close. The return of her kiss is it’s own shade of orange. It is a hot breeze in mid-July. It is the merging of dark and light. It is a strange awakening of a magic somewhere between witch and fairy. It is a magic of her own. She lets the light back in.


	5. Of Frost And Bone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Mermaid AU  
> Fandom: Once Upon A Time  
> Pair: Swan Queen
> 
> Summary: When the Jolly Roger gets struck by a winter storm Emma is cast overboard and rescued by a mermaid.

The water is so cold, capped with ice and stirring with a winter breeze. Winter seeps through her skin and into her veins without mercy. She wishes that the waves would just slam her into a craggy arch of limestone, would knock her out as cold as the waters.   
But they don’t, they are more content to toss her about like a floppy stuffed animal until her lungs can take no more. 

She supposes that, when you bed with a ruthless pirate, you are bound to get tossed to the waves. And so Emma sinks beneath the surface, wondering if Killian has met the same fate. She’d told them that it was a poor season for sailing.   
The man is--was?--so stubborn. And this time they are both--or maybe she alone is--paying the price for it. 

She closes her eyes and the cold wraps itself around her in a frigid hug. She feels fish swim past her and seaweed coil around her ankles. Her lifeforce begins to escape her in the form of clouds of bubbles. 

And then there is a warmth. A strange warmth that wraps around her and she knows that she has finally died. How else could it be so pleasantly warm. She can’t remember what happens next. The rush of water no longer sounds in her ears. The cold no longer burns her bones. She can’t smell salt nor fish any longer. 

And then she opens her eyes. And when she does the world comes back to life. Alive but somewhere entirely new. The sound of water is still there but it is muffled somehow and there is a fire crackling. Throwing shadows across the rocky walls of...of where ever she is. Perhaps a limestone cove? There are starfish and barnacles clinging to the wall. She knows that she is in the same waters because she can see chunks of ice drifting up to and knocking against the floor of this cavern.   
It smells the same but different. Like ocean water and seaweed but there is the cozy smell of the fire and something like flowers. She can’t name exactly which type. She hears the wind roar against the wall of the cove. 

More pleasant than any of the other sounds, she hears a voice. “What ship was it?”

“Hmm?” Emma mumbles. 

“What was the name of the ship that sunk?”

“The Jolly Roger. I was aboard the Jolly Roger.” It isn’t so jolly anymore. 

The woman nods. Emma spots her resting her arms upon the rocks, mostly submerged in the frosty waters. 

“Aren’t you cold?”

She shakes her head. “I’m more than used to this. It’s comfortable.” Emma catches the flick of a tail--onyx black with an oil slick iridescent. She tilts her head. 

“Not for me.” Emma shudders. “Are you some kind of ice mermaid?”

The woman laughs. “There are no ‘ice mermaids’, I’ve simply adapted to the waters I was born in.” 

“Can you do magic?” 

“How do you think I made the fire?” The woman asks. She heaves herself out of the water. In a shimmering swirl of purple light, she swaps her tail for legs. “Regina Mills.” She holds out her hand. 

Emma takes it, it is surprisingly warm.

“Can you take me home?”

She nods, I can eventually, yes.” She replies. “But I was hoping that you could keep me company for the night. I don’t come by many people; it’s quite lonely.”

“Don’t you have other mermaids?”

She shakes her head. “I’m one of the few that has adapted to…” she gestures to the blocks of ice. 

“Are you part seal by chance?”

She doesn’t seem entertained by the remark. “I am not, no.” 

Emma laughs. “I was just joking. And, sure, I’ll spend the night with you. You did save my life.” She smiles. 

At this the woman seems satisfied. She makes herself comfy in front of the fire. “Next time you plan on sailing I recommend doing so in better weather. I have so many stories of dead sailors.” She holds up her necklace, the bones upon it crack together. “I found these at various wreck sites.”

Emma quirks a brow, “that’s a little morbid, don’t you think?”

Regina shrugs. “It’s an aesthetic.”

“So you’re an evil mermaid?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t kill them, I simply make use of what they leave behind. You’re thinking of sirens.” 

“Interesting.” Emma replies. “Terrifying, but interesting.” 

Regina takes off her bracelet and puts it around Emma’s wrist. “Don’t worry, this one is made of fishbone.”

“What’s it for?”

“I would like to talk to you again after tonight, if you would do me the pleasure. I can find you if you wear this.” 

Emma nods. The woman had saved her life, she supposes that it couldn’t hurt to get to know her a little more. And besides, she can’t say that she would get another chance to talk to another mermaid, much less a mermaid as compelling and alluring as this one. 

Emma watches her lay down, firelight reflects in her beautiful brown eyes. She supposes that she had sought out an adventure. She clears her throat, “I didn’t see the Jolly Roger sink. Could you help me find it, I don’t think that Killian is dead.”

“Killian?”

“My friend.”

“Just a friend?”

“Just a friend.” 

“I can help you search, on one condition.” 

Emma inhales, “what condition.” 

“When we find the ship, let me board it. I want to see the human world.”

“You have a deal, Mills.” 

The mermaid smiles. Indeed, Emma wanted an adventure. She has a feeling that she will be getting more than her fill of one.


	6. Smile

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Shame  
> Fandom: Avatar  
> Pair: Azula/Suki  
> Summary: Azula gets braces which causes her another struggle with self-image.

“Come on just one tiny little smile?” Suki requests. 

Azula’s frown only deepens and she shakes her head. At any rate, her mouth is too sore for a smile. 

“Not even a really quick one, like a two second flash?”

“No.” Azula mumbles. 

“You’re cranky today.” 

She imagines that Suki would be at least a little cranky too if she had her mouth poked and prodded at all morning. She would be even more cranky if she came out of the ordeal looking at least a percentage or so less attractive. 

She has decided that she won’t be smiling until the braces come off and no amount of coaxing would be changing that. 

“Come on, you promised.”

“I did not.” 

“You did so.” Suki insists. “You said that if I gave you the rest of my cinnamon sweet rolls that you would show me your braces.”

Azula clears her throat. “Yes, Suki. There is a term for what I did.”

“And what’s that.”

“Lied.”

“Seriously.” Suki crinkles her nose. She elbows Azula in the ribcage, “come on, I want to see them.” 

“For what?” She grumbles. Likely so she can decide whether or not it would be worth it to kiss her ever again. Azula wagers that she will decide that it is not worth the risk of possibly cutting her lips on metal bits. Azula has already cut her own tongue on them. It has been only an hour and they have already made her suffer at least a day’s worth of pain. 

“You can’t just never smile again.”

“Mai hasn’t smiled once since I’ve met her, it is very possible to never smile again.” Azula assures her. “And this abysmal school will make it very easy to stick to it.”

Suki laughs. “Well, what if, one day, we’re at tennis practice and Katara accidentally hits herself in the face with the racket again?”

“Then she’ll have to get more creative, because it’s only funny the first time.” Azula replies. 

“Come on, Azula, I’m sure that they’re cute. TyLee would probably like them.”

“TyLee thinks that everything is cute and you are obligated to say so.”

“Obligated?”

“Because you are my girlfriend. Yue said that, that is one of the rules of a relationship…”

Suki rolls her eyes. “Yue lives in a daydream world and thinks that a relationship has to be all fluffy. That’s why she has a crush on Chan.” 

Azula leans up against her locker and looks down the hall. The last buses are pulling out of the parking lot. “We should head to the courts…”

“We should. And we will. After you show me your braces.” 

“Suki, they look ridiculous.”

“Wonderful!” She gives a mischievous grin. “They match well with the rest of your face, you like matching stuff.” 

Her face flushes and she very nearly swats Suki with her assigned reading novel. Instead she tucks it into her backpack and folds her arms across her chest. She is already something of an awkward loner, the last thing she had needed was this. A mouthful of metal is probably just enough to tip the scales towards the lower end of the social spectrum. 

And if she takes a tennis ball to the face it will hurt doubly so when the metal scrapes her lips. If she bites down the wrong way…

She won’t even be able to enjoy her mochi. There is a whole list of things that she can’t have anymore. And the likelihood of food getting stuck in them…

She bunches her nose in disgust. 

She hasn’t even seen Zuzu yet. He is probably itching to make fun of her for her predicament, with or without having seen the braces. Spirits know that he has years of teasing and jesting to get back at her for. 

“It’s shameful.”

Suki rolls her eyes. “Drama club is that way.” She thumbs down the hall.

Azula narrows her eyes. “I didn’t want to get them…” but she didn’t want misaligned teeth either…

She wishes that she hadn’t been born with such an unfortunate dental situation. 

**.oOo.**

Azula is stubbornly true to her word. Suki hasn’t seen her smile once since getting her braces. Pictures are almost entirely out of the question unless they let her do one of those little close-mouthed half smiles. 

All of her attempts to make Azula smile naturally just miss the mark. Or maybe they haven’t missed; she thinks that Azula has spent too much time training herself to laugh in such a refined way as to not show her teeth.

Suki sighs, she is quite certain that she is going to have to find a quiet spot in the bleachers and sit her down for a little talk. The serious, heavy sort that she is no good at. The sort that involves bringing up her girlfriend’s stressfully high standards.

She supposes that they have been long overdue for another one of those, she hasn’t been this dissatisfied with herself since leaving her father’s house to live with her mother. It would seem like old habits are never truly shed. 

She feels a pair of arms wrap around her torso and lips brush against her ear. “Good morning, Azula.”

“It’s afternoon currently.” Azula corrects. “Here.” She holds out a small box. It smells sugary and sweet and rests warmly in her grasp. 

“What’s this?”

“Open it.”

She tugs on the little ribbon and opens the box to see a lightly iced cinnamon bun with an arrangement of red sprinkles. 

“What’s this for?”

Azula shrugs. “Since I didn’t hold up my end of the bargain.”

Suki is both touched and saddened. She really hated her braces enough to spend time baking a new cinnamon roll to get out of her deal. “Thanks, Azula.” She bites into the treat. It is absolutely sublime, pleasantly warm and baked to a perfect golden brown. “This tastes amazing.” She smiles. “Did you make it yourself.”

Azula nods. “I had Katara help. But I did most of the work.” 

“Well it’s really good. I’ll save the rest for after practice.” 

Azula nods again. She is making it terribly difficult to request a difficult talk. For a while she is quiet, drumming her fingers against the lunchroom table. Maybe Suki ought to initiate the conversation now and get it over with. 

Suki touches Azula’s cheek, rubbing it tenderly the way the girl likes. She gives her a soft little kiss and pulls back. “I don’t think that it’s shameful.” She starts. “You have braces. There are so many people who need them.”

“Yes, and it’s a shame that I am one of them.” She insists.

“You don’t always have to be perfect.” Suki says for what has to be the thousandth time. “Especially around me. You can just be you.”

“I am fine being me. I would just rather look like me but without braces.” 

“And last year you would have just rather looked like you but with longer hair. And the year before that you would have just rather looked like you but with bigger boobs.” 

Azula flushes again but Suki pushes on. “There’s always something, Azula.You always want to change something, and you don’t have to…”

“Yes, well this time I was fine with how I looked before…”

Suki quirks a brow. “Azula, you got the braces because you weren’t satisfied before. And you should be because…” she gestures to all of Azula. “Look at you.” 

“I would rather look at you.”

“Cute, Azula. Super cheesy, totally a diversion, but cute.” 

“I hope that you’re not expecting me to smile now.” 

Suki shakes her head. “Not right now, no. But when someone makes you laugh, when you’re happy. When you win tonight’s game.”

**.oOo.**

She isn’t sure why this is so difficult.The change is so minor and so temporary. And yet she is feeling just as out of sorts and uncomfortable as she had when she’d cut her own hair. She still hasn’t smiled and she is almost sure that it has nothing to do with the people around her. She is decently worried about what they will have to say about her. But she is more worried about what she will say to herself if she looks in the mirror or sees her tainted smile in a photo. 

She is tired of feeling this way. 

She wishes that she could just stop. 

She feels Suki’s hand cup over hers. 

She is lucky that she has the girl, she would surely spiral if she didn’t. With her free hand, she touches her fingers to her lips. She certainly isn’t in the smiling mood. Not until Suki kisses her again, several times, once on the forehead, once on the lips, and once on the nose. She has always been fond of those little nose kisses. Suki knows this and she gives her a second. 

She clutches Suki’s hand in her own. The girl had been right; there always is something that she wants to fix about herself. Even if it doesn’t need fixing. Most of the time she doesn’t even fix it, the desire simply passes. Such was the case when she wished that she were taller. And in that instance, she had actually grown quite fond of her small self. It makes her agile and speedy, a real menace on the tennis court. She had eventually grown fond of her shorter hair too, though she much prefers it long. She supposes that just because something isn’t preferable, doesn’t mean that it is horrible or ugly. Her therapist has assured her has much time and time again. She just has to get around to remembering it. 

“I guess that you can look at them.” She mutters.

She supposes that the only way to get reassurance would be to let at least one person see.

**.oOo.**

Her smile is more forced than any smile Suki has ever seen, but it is a smile no less. She had expected Azula to pick out the clear brackets. Instead she had chosen alternating golds and blues. For someone who is trying to avoid drawing attention, she has sure picked eye catching colors.

Somehow, Suki can’t picture it any other way. “They match your eyes.”

Azula blinks. 

“They suit the rest of your face.” She clarifies. “Honestly, I think that they make you look smarter.” 

“They do?” 

Suki nods. “You should get Katara to let you try on her glasses! They’re blue so they would look nice too.”

Azula seems to fidget with the buttons on her uniform. “Good luck convincing her to let me, she hasn’t parted with those glasses since she got them.” 

“Have you looked at yourself yet?” 

Azula shakes her head. 

“One step at a time, right?”

“Yes, one step at a time.”

“How about this, I get Katara to let you borrow her glasses, and you look at yourself in the mirror?”

**.oOo.**

Standing before the mirror, Azula wishes that she hadn’t made the deal. Katara promises that the glasses suit her well. And Suki swears that she looks amazing and sophisticated. When she finally brings herself to open her eyes, everything is a blur. 

“Well, what do you think?”

“I think that Katara and I don’t have the same prescription.” She takes them off and rubs her eyes. 

“We can’t all have 20-20.” Katara rolls her eyes as she puts her glasses back on. 

“I figured you’d say that.” Suki holds out her phone.

Azula swallows and takes the device. Her face, as it appears on the screen isn’t exactly unflattering. She supposes that Suki is right, the glasses and braces do add some degree of sophistication. Perhaps if she holds her head a little higher and makes her expression a little bolder she can do herself favors. “I...I don’t hate it.” She stuffs her hands into her pockets.

“That’s a start.” Katara smiles warmly.

“And by the time you finish, you’re going to miss them.”

Azula crinkles her nose. “I will not miss not being able to eat mochi. I certainly won’t miss these poking wires…” 

Suki pulls her into a hug and ruffles her hair. “That’s fair. But at least you’ll be more comfortable by the end of it.” 

“Define comfortable. There’s nothing comfortable about a mild but constant throbbing.” 

**.oOo.**

Suki rolls her eyes. At least her complaints have shifted from a poor self image to the physical discomforts. 

She just hopes that Azula knows that she is perfect just as she is. That there is no shame in a perfect collection of imperfections. 

She slings her arm over Azula’s shoulders and kisses her cheek. “Let’s get to practice.” 


	7. Creeping Ice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Heart  
> Fandom: Winx Club  
> Pair: Icy/Lucy
> 
> Summary: Lucy asks Icy on a date. Icy accepts for the sake of humiliating the woman. She doesn't expect to actually enjoy her company.

A paper bat wing, because hearts are too cliche. She slips it under the door and leaves in haste. 

She hopes that this time it will be reciprocated or appreciated. 

She has a feeling that it won’t be reciprocated even slightly. More likely, she will be mocked and ridiculed again. What a fool she is to try to chase after someone so painfully obviously cold. Someone so far out of her league. 

Why is her heart so...misguided? Why can’t it be as dark and warped as Cloud Tower itself. That would be wonderful. That would be easy. It would beat pining over a woman who would rather see her spelled and hexed into oblivion. 

Even Mirta isn’t this foolish. 

Even Mirta isn’t setting herself up for this much humiliation. 

And yet, she comes back to her dorm to find a note on the floor. Her hands shake as she opens it. She knows what she is going to find; she just isn’t sure how harsh and humiliating the rejection will be. Icy is mighty creative and her creativity has a razor’s edge. 

It is frank and to the point, written in elegant cursive. The kind that she thought the ice witch ought to have. ‘Fine. 11:30 at the Broom & Hex Cafe.’ She stares at the silver ink, her hands shake with twice the force. 

She has a date. 

She has a date and yet she can’t quite believe that she does. 

She knows exactly how this is going to end. Really there’s only one way that it can, realistically speaking. But, how pathetic she is, she craves the witch so much that she is more than willing to face further humiliation just for a taste of what she craves. Just for a lovely little illusion. 

**.oOo.**

“Oh she’s going to weep.” Stormy chuckles. 

“She’s going to do more than weep by the time I’m through.” Icy vows. 

“And here I thought that I was the devious, alluring one.” Darcy quirks a brow and runs her fingers through her locks. 

“You just keep toying with Riven, I’ll make sure that Lucy doesn’t lurk outside our dorm ever again. I never was a fan of Fae Hearts's day, ladies. But this will be one to remember.”

“But wait!” Stormy bolts upright. “What if she, like, loses it and gets more obsessive and weird?” 

“Then we’ll teach her another lesson.” Darcy shrugs.” 

All she will have to do is endure one loathsome day. A few hours of false gushing and pseudo sweet talk will pave the way for days of wicked delight. 

**.oOo.**

The cafe is particularly crowded when she arrives, dressed in her favorite ripped plaid dress and a set of matching arm warmers that are at least a size or two too big. She swallows and takes a deep breath as she searches the ice witch out. It only takes one quick sweep to know that she isn’t there--the woman is the sort to stand out rather starkly. But she does a second and third sweep anyhow. 

She has to laugh, of course she wouldn’t even show up. That’s the oldest trick in the book. But she had so fervently hoped that Icy would at least pretend to love her for an hour or so. 

“You’re early.” 

Lucy jerks. 

“You showed up?” 

Icy quirks a brow. “You’re welcome.” She breezes by. “We’ll sit over there.” She points to the table at the very center of the room. The one that is already occupied. “I always sit there.”

“But that spot is already taken.”

She snaps her fingers and the platters on the table begin to wriggle and crawl. And then they are knocked to the floor as the couple scrambles away. Worms, grubs, and roaches turn back to soup, chili, and gummies. She snaps a second time and the mess is cleaned. “Looks vacant to me.”

“You’re terrible.” 

“The vileist.” Icy smirks. 

“It’s admirable.” 

“Naturally.” She pulls out a chair. “Sit. Tell me about yourself, and make it good, I don’t waste my time on losers.”

“I’m not.” 

“Convince me.” 

She clears her throat. She hadn’t realized that this was going to be an interview. “I thought that this was a date.” She scoffs. “Not an interrogation.”

Icy crosses her arms and leans back in her chair. 

“I can play the guitar.” She caves. 

“The guitar? I play myself. What brand and model?” 

“I have a SpiderMistress, Cauldron Green. You?”

“SpiderMistress as well. Midnight Hex.” 

Lucy’s eyes go wide. “How’d you get that? Those models are super expensive.” 

“I won it at a competition a few years back.” 

“Maybe we can, I don’t know, have some kind of practice together! Are you, Darcy, and Stormy in a band.”

Icy snickers. “We don’t have time for that. Though I suppose that Stormy is a pretty capable singer and Darcy wouldn’t be terrible on the drums.” She shrugs. “Anyways, it’s a useless hobby.”

“Why do you say that?” 

She catches a flicker of something in the woman’s frigid eyes. Something sincere, sad, regretful? It is gone before she can decipher it. Gone so fast that she may have imagined it entirely. “It means nothing compared to higher goals. I have ambitions, real ambitions.” 

“And talent.” Lucy declares. “I haven’t heard you play but you’re good at everything else you do.”

“True.” Icy replies. “But I’ve been told that my talents are best invested elsewhere. I think I’d like a bigger following than a handful of groupies.” 

The way groupies rolls off of her tongue. That pointed stare…

Lucy’s heart sinks. 

She is pathetic, she knows that she is. Really she isn’t much better than a groupie and Icy isn’t even famous. 

She pushes it down and tries to play it off. “Yeah. Why settle for less when you can have more?” She wonders if she is settling for less by trying for someone who thinks of her as less. 

“Yes, that’s a good question. Why would I settle for less.”

Lucy’s heart sinks further. 

“My powers are nice and all but I think that with a touch of dragon fire magic…” she trails off and takes a spoonful of ice cream. “That’ll make a real show, don’t you think?”

Lucy nods vigorously. “I mean your magic is amazing the way it is. You’re the most powerful witch that I know. But how badass would it be to have fire and ice magic?” She is kissing so much ass. Gushing and rambling and making a fool of herself. She wishes that they could just stick to talking about guitars. “What would you do with all of that power?”

“I haven’t decided yet.” Icy replies. She holds out her spoon, “have a taste.”

She wants to, desperately, just to taste the witch on her tongue. But how sadly desperate would that look. “After you licked it?” She crinkles her nose. 

Icy scoffs. “How do you plan to…” she leans in closer. “Make out if you can’t even share a spoon with me.” 

Lucy swallows. “Licking a spoon isn’t as exciting as making out. All or nothing.” She does a lot of big talk for someone with such low confidence. 

Icy quirks a brow. “All or nothing.” She shrugs. And with an alarming abruptness, she pulls Lucy in by the collar and plants her lips upon hers. They are as frosty as she had expected and she tastes of spearmint and cigarettes. She smells of it too. She tangles her long blue fingernails in her hair. She is vicious and merciless, it’s exhilarating. 

And she pulls back. “Wow, that was the most underwhelming kiss I’ve ever had. Usually they at least try to impress me.”

“I wasn’t ready!”

“Improv, my dear.” She drawls. She leans back once more, draping her hands on the arm rests. 

And something snaps. Something that should have snapped ages ago. But it comes as a desire. A desire to shove the chair over if only to see that smug, conceited smirk crack. To shatter the woman’s ego if only for a moment. 

“You know what, I don’t know why I tried!” She stands up with a quickness that knocks the chair to the floor. She has to keep her momentum before it vacates. “I think that it’s because I feel bad for you. You’re hollow and shallow and...and…” her lip twitches into a snarl, “you aren’t as amazing as you think you are. Do you even think that you’re amazing?” She isn’t sure how to end her rant so she finishes with the first thing that comes to mind, “you can have the most expensive guitar on the market but that doesn’t mean that you have the talent to play it.” 

And it is gone, that smug, conceited look. 

Gone and she hadn’t had to even raise a fist. She balls them both and makes her way to the door. 

She has dignity. 

She has self-respect. 

And she deserves more than a stupid game.

All or nothing.

All of the nothing in the world is better than letting herself chase after one moment of false love. Her heart isn’t so foolish as she had thought. 

**.oOo.**

It wasn’t supposed to have gone like that. Lucy wasn’t supposed to have left. That was her role. She rubs her hands over her face. She was supposed to be doing the humiliating. Not that she hadn’t been able to save herself the worst of it with a remark about how dramatic witches these days are. 

But that isn’t it. That isn’t what keeps itching and clawing at her mind. She lightly raps her fist against her forehead, as though she can knock the deeper, more disturbing implications from her mind. 

She wishes that the woman would have just flinched and cried like the rest of them. She wishes that Lucy were as unbearable, cringe-inducing, and repulsive as she had assumed that she would be. She was supposed to have been intolerably embarrassing to be around. 

She wasn’t supposed to have talked about guitars or bands or anything that Icy is thoroughly and truly interested in. She wasn’t supposed to have made these things sound so intriguing and worth investing time into. 

And she certainly wasn’t supposed to have shown any teeth. 

Icy doesn’t think that anyone has had the balls to stand up to her so publicly and, God, how intriguing it is. She cringes to herself. Not Lucy. Not loser Lucy. It can’t be her of all people. Especially not after the game she’d tried to play. 

The game that she’d lost. 

Lost and swapped decks. 

She inhales deeply. She supposes that she will just have to do what she does well, encase her heart in ice much thicker and colder than before. The feeling will pass, it always does. She has just as little time for romance as she does for silly guitar riffs. 

She lays back and stares at the ceiling until Darcy and Stormy enter. 

**.oOo.**

She notices Icy lingering. 

Lingering and, dare she say, lurking. It is almost laughable. It could be that she is waiting for an opportunity to strike, watching and observing for weaknesses, an opening to take her vengeance. But somehow she senses that this isn’t the case. 

No. The witch is exuding the very same energy that she once had. 

She thinks that it would be plenty satisfying to march right up to her and let her know that she has been well aware of her presence and watch her stumble over a lie about how she had only been stalking about for the sake of feeling out the enemy.

It would be satisfying twice over to make a scene of it, to deal out the same brand of humiliation that the ice witch had intended for her. 

If only Lucy didn’t still feel so drawn to her. 

If only Icy wasn’t everything she admired in a person; bold, confident, suave, and cool. If only she weren’t so beautiful in a cutting, razorlike way that is all her own. 

She can very well toy with the woman, blackmail and mock her, rouse her hatred and contemptment. She can’t help but do so at least a little. “See something you like?” She calls into the hallway. She expects the woman to slink away with a muttered curse or two. Instead she slips out into the open and leans against the frame of the door with her arms folded across her chest as though she had intended to be seen in the first place. 

“Perhaps a few things.” She flicks her hair. “We didn’t finish our date, Lucy.” 

“I lost interest.”

Icy quirks a brow, “did you?”

She wishes that she had. “Mostly.” 

“That’s a shame.” She shrugs. “I admit, you piqued mine. I didn’t realize that you had fight.” 

It occurs to her that perhaps the ice witch is very much into that. Into someone who is willing to get in her face and fight back. She can’t imagine that many people would. 

“It’s compelling. Keeps things intense.” She continues. 

“Well, while you look for fights, I’m going to look for respect.” Now that she has found it she isn’t willing to let it go so easily.

Icy is quiet for a moment. “You have already.” 

“Was that a compliment?” 

**.oOo.**

The deeper this conversation goes the less worth she thinks it has. She is going to make a fool of herself, and for what? Love? That isn’t the downfall she has in mind for herself. “Don’t push your luck, Lucy. I still have curses and hexes that will…”

“Make me regret ever setting foot in Cloud Tower? Yeah, I get the gist.” 

“Do you?”

“Get to the point. Are you here to hex me or kiss me?” 

Really, why not both? “I guess that, that’s up to you.” Though she supposes that she’d much prefer to have another go at the woman’s lips. “Show me what you can do now that you’re prepared.” 

Lucy grips the door and Icy is certain that it is about to slam in her face. Instead the woman damn near throws her into the wall. Her kiss is rough, almost savage. Intriguing. She curls her fingers into strands of dark green hair and adds a frosty edge of her own. And then Lucy pulls back as abruptly as she had engaged. Her breathing is still decently ragged. “Improv, my dear.” She says again, “can make or break the moment, do you understand now.” 

Lucy nods. “Perfectly.” 

“Well then...” Icy trails a finger over the woman’s cheek, content to have taken back at least some control. 

“Well then, what?” She puts her hands on her hips.

“Are you interested in a  _ real  _ date?”

“Don’t you have a reputation to uphold?”

Icy rolls her eyes, “I’m the one who decides what’s in and what’s out. Welcome to the in crowd, Lucy.” So long as she keeps up with her newfound confidence she will stay for quite a long time. And with luck Icy won’t have to do any of the work to keep her at the top. “It suits you better, Lucy. This, self-respect thing.” 

**.oOo.**

A second date.

A real date.

Her heart thrums faster than it has in a while. And the ice witch doesn’t think that she’s pathetic. And when they speak in the halls it feels different, she doesn’t call her a loser this time. She doesn’t dismiss her, doesn’t mock her with Darcy and Stormy when she is just on the fringes of earshot. 

It doesn’t take terribly long for the two of them to get used to her stopping by the dorm. They still whisper. She still hears them questioning and pestering Icy. Icy invites her over more. Icy makes a point of slinking as close to her as possible, of getting handsy, of initiating deep kisses. 

“If they hate what your doing,” she mutters in Lucy’s ear, her voice husky with passion, “do it in front of them, exaggerate it, give them something to  _ really  _ talk about.” 

She wonders if Icy has always been so bold or if it is the product of trial and error and one big sweeping success that has driven her to the top. 

“You have much more allure when you aren’t copying everything that I do.” 

“I’ve found that there isn’t anything worth copying.” Lucy smirks. 

Icy gives a haughty sniff, “fuck you, Lucy.” She grabs her by the scruff of her shirt and pulls her onto the bed.

She wishes that she would have found her sense of self worth earlier. 


	8. The Witch & The Princess

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Blue  
> Fandom(s): Winx & Avatar  
> Pair: Azula/Icy
> 
> Summary: Icy pulls a woman out of Lake Roccaluce. A woman who can wield fire but radiates no magical energy. Icy would like to take this power for her own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This prompt can very well become a long fic, hence why it looks incomplete.

It was the fire, that small flickering blue flame. It draws her in like a wraith to a pure white soul. She is a mystery, she is rather shrouded in it. Mostly she sleeps, and when she wakes she stares at that little blue flame in her palm. Icy thinks that something has broken in the women’s mind; that whatever has transported her here has left a part of her mind where she had been. 

Icy runs a comb through her locks. She has already bathed the woman and dressed her for bed. Three days now. This is the longest she has slept for. Icy scoops her up and tucks her into bed. Any longer and she will have to take her to the hospital. Realistically she can’t care for her and food potions can only substitute so much.

She stares at the woman, watching the steady rise and fall of her chest, it is the only sign that she is still alive. She picks up her hand and brushes her thumb over the woman’s soft skin. She is warm, she is always so warm. And she supposes that that is a good sign. As good a sign as it is for Icy to be perpetually frigid to the touch. 

She brushes a strand of hair out of her face. Her hair is losing its gloss, it isn’t so shimmeringly black anymore. And the woman’s face is becoming hollow, subtly so but just enough to cause alarm. And Icy isn’t sure why she cares. Why this woman in particular leaves her inclined to extend care. The sort that Darcy and Stormy have been questioning for a while now. All she can say is that there is something about her. Something intriguing. Something powerful.

Something that would suit their group so well. 

This woman certainly isn’t a fairy, she doesn’t have the wings. 

But she has the magic.

Icy sees that little flickering flame in her mind’s eye. 

It licks in shades of sapphire, it burns hotter than the dragonfire. So much hotter that Icy found herself drawing her whisperian crystal. It should have been easy pickings, to syphon that power from her. She would wake to find it gone and without a clue as to where it had gone. But there had been nothing to pull. No magical energy for the crystal to latch onto and yank. 

This woman isn’t a fairy. 

She isn’t a witch. 

She has no magical energy and yet that small blue flame dances in her palm. 

**.oOo.**

When she wakes she is still in this world, this strange place with its strange energies and technologies. Azula isn’t entirely sure that it is real at all. It might be that she has gotten herself killed trying to reach the bottom of that spirit pool. Just as possible, is that it has spit her out here in this world. She very vaguely remembers being pulled out of a much larger pond in a thick forest of pine. 

She vaguely remembers a cold like none that she has ever felt before. She feels that cold now. It seeps into her bones and puts a queasiness in her belly. There is coldness in death. Cold is death. 

And maybe it is better this way…

“You’re awake again.”

Azula swallows. It is that woman, the ghost woman. She is always there. Staring with ice blue eyes. She holds herself tall and taller still with white-blue hair fashioned into a high ponytail. Her skin is so pale, so pale that it is nearly white as well. 

Her words register. “I’m alive?”

“As far as I know.” The woman shrugs. “This is the first coherent conversation we’ve had. You’ve been here for almost a month. Generally speaking, the undead aren’t good for conversation.”

She can remember it in small blurs. Faint moments where she had woken in spurts to have a meal, toy with her fire, and--every now and then--change clothes. “The undead? You can talk to the undead?”

The woman shrugs again, “sure. Zombies, ghosts, the beasts that I conjure, my sleep paralysis demon…” she trails off. 

“Who are you?”

“I’m Icy. Resident asshole. Famous for trying to take over the world. Probably shouldn’t be allowed back on this campus.” 

Azula rubs her face. 

“Oh, right. You don’t know anything about this world, do you?”

Azula shakes her head. And the longer she is awake in it, the less she understands. There are things she has never seen before and they are all over. Fixtures overhead that light up the room--candles without any flames, rectangles that ring and buzz, bigger and flatter rectangles that glow and flash images, and scrips and scrolls that are wedged and bound into...rectangles. Everything in this world is rectangular. 

She dangles her legs over the side of the bed, a curtain of hair falls into her face. “What is this place?”

“Cloud Tower, school for witches. In the realm of Magix.” 

“Cloud Tower…” She furrows her brows. “Like the Air Temples?”

The woman laughs, “what the  _ fuck  _ are you talking about?”

“The Air Temples. Where all of the airbenders used to live. Before my nation eradicated them of course.”

“And where do you come from?”

“The Fire Nation.”

The woman makes a sound, “sounds dreadful.”

She is feeling weak and dizzy all over again. She slumps forward only to feel those cold hands holding her steady. 

“Could you possibly stay awake for more than ten minutes? I have questions.”

Azula tries to shake the dizziness from her head. “ _ You _ have questions? At least you’re in your own...universe.” 

She quirks a brow. “True.” She kicks her feet up and rests them upon her dresser. “Just answer me this; what are you?”

“Excuse me?” Azula’s lip curls back. “I’m a human being.” But, Agni, in the back of her mind she hears it all over again. That nagging notion that she is a monster. Some warped, twisted thing. 

“Humans can’t make fire with their hands. Fairies can, but you’re not a fairy.” She gestures between Azula’s shoulders. “And you aren’t a witch. You don’t have that…energy. You don’t have magical energy at all. And yet…”

Azula holds her hand out and lets the fire ignite. She closes her eyes and drinks in it’s comforts. 

“What are you?”

“I am a human being.” She repeats. 

“If you are human, then what do you call those without magic?”

“Nonbenders.” She replies. “That was more than one question.” 

“Yes, well you’re going to answer as many questions as I ask.”

Azula gives a haughty sniff. If nothing else, this woman is bringing her back to herself rather quickly. “And why would I do that? Do you think that I haven’t been trained to withstand interrogation?”

“I think that you have no idea what our magic can do. Does your fire come with the ability to…” the frigid woman snaps her fingers and the flameless candle resting on the nightstand shifts into a snake and slithers out of the room. 

Azula swallows. 

“One time I turned this happy-go-lucky, wannabe witch into a pumpkin. She wasn’t so perky and cheerful then. You don’t strike me as a pumpkin though. Maybe a lizard of some sort.” 

Azula narrows her eyes. “I can’t imagine that you’d get many answers from a lizard.” She drops herself back to the pillow and rolls away from this loathsome woman--Icy, she reminds herself.

“You never told me your name.” 

“Azula. Princess Azula.”

**.oOo.**

So another fire princess. Icy would ponder that this woman is Bloom, perhaps from another universe, but she has too much bite. No, that isn’t it. The fairy has bite. This woman has something else. A darkness, a cunning, she can sense it on her in the same way that it radiates off of Darcy. 

It is as compelling as her little blue flame. Decidedly she won’t transform the woman into anything, not permanently at least. This Princess Azula is too interesting for something like that. 

“I have one more question.”

Azula doesn’t answer, she simply rubs her cheek against the pillow.

“Are you going to start feeding and bathing yourself now or am I going to have to continue?”

The woman’s face goes red. “I am perfectly capable.” She replies stiffly and with an even more rigid, “thank you.” 

Well mannered, this one. She might not enjoy Stormy so well. “Well, when you’re more awake, I can introduce you to my sisters.”

“With luck, you’ll never meet my brother.” Azula grumbles. She rolls onto her back and stretches her arms. “Get me something to drink.”

“I don’t take orders. I give them.” Icy replies plainly. 

“You aren’t a princess. You take orders.” 

Icy quirks a brow, “see that’s the thing, you aren’t a princess here. You aren’t anything at all, really. How can you be when you probably shouldn’t exist here at all. I’ll get you your drink,  _ princess _ , but consider it a charity.”

She expects the girl to chuck a ball of that strange blue fire and then toss a barrage of furious insults. Instead the girl sits back up and stares at her with a petrifyingly blank expression. She holds her hand out. 

Oh the dark energy that radiates off of this one is sublime. It holds a coldness that Icy can bask in. 

She plucks the glass into her hand. “I don’t like many things, princess, I don’t like anything at all really. Or anyone. But I think that you’ll do just well with me and my sisters.” 


End file.
